I wonder how many readers of the Toronto Star’s senior political writer Susan Delacourt know that her brother John is a long-time paid Liberal operative?
John Delacourt has worked for ex-Liberal MP (and now wannabe BC Liberal MLA) Sukh Dhaliwal (see here), ex-Liberal MP Joe Volpe (see here) and Manager of Multicultural Outreach for ex-Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff (see here).
Although I’ve never seen Delacourt declare this conflict of interest whenever she has written on any of them, maybe others have?
I’ve asked her this:
Is your brother John working on Trudeau’s leadership campaign similarly as he did for Ignatieff?
And will get back to you if she replies.
Update: Susan Delacourt responded to my question with snark
@bcbluecon 38,000 tweets. 1,000-or-so followers. Somebody’s trying to tell you something, sir. Happy New Year and better luck in 2013.
Then applauds herself when Liberal insider Rob Silver and Globe’s Tabatha Southey guffaw at her stunning wit:
@RobSilver @TabathaSouthey And happy 2013 to you! (Sometimes, it’s useful to hold up the hand, with thumb and forefinger one inch apart.)
But then suddenly has a change of heart maybe because of all the flack she was taking on Twitter:
@bcbluecon 613-237-1773 anytime after Jan. 8 if you want to chat to a real person about your mix of fact and fiction.
To which I replied that I prefer email:
@SusanDelacourt That way everything is on the record for me to post on-line
BC Blue: One BC Conservative's view on it all... 
January 2, 2013 at 12:28 PM
Not sure that Susan Delacourt’s brother working for Liberals means a whole lot on it’s own. My whole immediate family (brothers, sisters, parents) are Liberal and/or NDP socialists (sad to say) and I do not share their political views AT ALL!
If she was seen to be socializing or sourcing stories with her brother’s employers or his political crowd, or something along those lines, that’d definitely be cause for complaints to her employer.
Susan may well be a Liberal fan herself (and I assume she’s NOT a conservative by nature), but family connections may or may not have anything to do with her political leanings/writings – a hard thing to prove one way or the other.
An interesting fact, nonetheless.
January 2, 2013 at 12:56 PM
You work as a journalist?
January 2, 2013 at 12:30 PM
She is on all the panels… and NEVER HAS A GOOD WORD TO SAY ABOUT PM HARPER…. wonder why??
January 2, 2013 at 12:31 PM
PLUS – now we know WHY trudeau’s picture is front and centre of the Star everyday…. What a joke!!!
January 2, 2013 at 5:03 PM
When you read her dumb column in the star, you can almost hear her swooning over the Turdo. Saliva spills between the words of praise she has for the moron. Dean, now I can see why her sickeningly bias articles are always for the pointed headed liberals. Keep up the good work Dean.
January 2, 2013 at 5:06 PM
I see Delaquart has picked a fight over the phone with Dean. Well, Dean wants to keep it email so there is a written record. She’ll back out of that debate right quick methinks.
January 2, 2013 at 5:48 PM
“I wonder how many readers of the Toronto Star’s senior political writer Susan Delacourt know that her brother John is a long-time paid Liberal operative?”
I,for one, didn’t know that. As “Guffman” says, it MIGHT not make any difference in her reporting, but given that I’ve never seen anything Susan Delacourt has written that is complementary to Stephen Harper, have to believe she’s of the same ilk as her bro.
Sometimes the background and family connections of the MSM personalities are more interesting than THEY are. I only found out a few weeks ago that Amanda Lang of CBC fame is the daughter of former Liberal Cabinet Minister Otto Lang,which explains her liberalism.
Thanks for sharing that info on Delacourt,Dean.
January 2, 2013 at 5:58 PM
Interview her over the phone and (with her permission) record it.
January 2, 2013 at 6:05 PM
Worthy idea. But you don’t need permission in Canada to record a conversation in which you participate.
January 2, 2013 at 6:03 PM
It very much matters. Susan Delacourt herself has always been a Liberal, whether she was at Star or Globe. And it’s something you should declare when you have a senior role in national media (in print and on TV). Likewise, the insufferable Kady O’Malley has deep political connections, but she is pretty forthcoming about them in her twitter feed. Her NDP honcho dad wrote the motion advanced by the NDP’s Bob Rae in 1979 which felled the Clark PC Gov’t. She has tweeted that more than once, with pride. She is biased but she doesn’t hide it; she may not even realize it.
It matters because politics does run in families — and in Ottawa bars, where the same Parliamentary Press Gallery types hang out together for years, sometimes cultivating contacts or most often being cultivated. But the great ones have hidden it or admitted it, not out and out denied it. I mean people like Liberal Val Sears, who could write balanced prose (for the Toronto Star), The Star’s Richard Gwyn who was known for his trying to be fair, former NDP MP Doug Fisher and even Charles Lynch whom I once worked with was seen by some as more Liberal than neutral (but I think he didn’t see it that way).
January 2, 2013 at 6:58 PM
Here’s why I asked you to call me, Dean … Because internet bullies/name-callers usually go mute when they have to actually talk to the person they’ve chosen as their targets. I see you’ve done the same. You want something you can post. It’s actually not that brave to request that. So here it is:
First… The “crying over Ignatieff’s retirement party” thing is in some way a reference, I believe, to a SunMedia report of early May, 2011, that was fictitious. (Or, as we like to say in my world, libellous.) But if you’re interested in filling out the picture at all — that report was based on a sighting of other reporters, including SunMedia, in the room, crying with Peter Donolo after the campaign was over on May 3, 2011. Problem: I wasn’t there. I was upstairs in the hotel lobby, getting bad news about my Dad’s health, and trying to get on an early plane to see him and my Mom. Was I upset that day? You bet I was. Did SunMedia tell the proper story of its own reporters crying and hugging Donolo, while this reporter wasn’t there? No it did not. Did Ezra Levant know that story and report something different? Yes he did. Do photos exist of the truth? Yes. Could I probably sue over this? Yes I could, but it’s not worth it. No one actually believed the story, except a handful of people who watched the show.
Second: My brother has worked for the Liberals. My husband has worked for the Conservatives. (A B.C. Conservative backbencher, in fact.) I am a journalist. I was long before before the employment histories of my family. I don’t wear team colours. I’m actually kind of suspicious of people who do. Seems kind of limiting.
Third: I am also suspicious of people who throw out gratuitous shots on Twitter all day long, call people names, and don’t have the guts to say these things to these people in person. Give me a call — tell me what your problem is. Man up, pick up the phone and have the courage to do something more than bathroom graffiti with your political views. 613-237-1773. I’m there next week.
P.S. I’m sure you’re enjoying this much attention. It’s way more than your comments are worth. I call this a New Year’s gift.
January 2, 2013 at 8:30 PM
[…] Delacourt has responded to my earlier bog post about her brother being a paid Liberal operative (see here). Below it is Sun News’ Ezra Levant’s reply to her assertion that his story was […]